Hook Reborn
by VictorianChik
Summary: Sequel to Hooked on Power. Arriving in modern-day America, Hook and Peter must learn to adjust in the new world. Yet, this new life presents more problems than Neverland ever could. Warning: spanking in some chapters and some angst
1. Brave New World

Hook stared in amazement at the new world in which he had been so unceremoniously dropped. It looked different than the earth he remembered. England had been a dirty, dank place that stank of sewage and horses and mud only to be changed occasionally with smells of rum and beer and hot muffins and meat pies.

This world was clean and fresh except for the stink of the moving boxes and the hot air blowing out of metal cages on the pavement. Hook looked down into the cages, trying to see where they lead to, but a man walked by and asked, "Lose something in the grate?"

"Where am I?" Hook asked, standing up straight. "And who might I have the pleasure of knowing?"

The man backed away with a wary eye. "There's a rehab center down this road. Get clean and stay off drugs, man."

As the man walked away, Hook reached for his sword to challenge the man to a duel for insulting him, but Hook found that his sword was gone. Instead, a leather pouch hung from his thick leather belt, a pouch that Hook had never seen before. He reached into it and drew out a thick folded card. He opened it to find the spidery script of a letter.

_Dearest Jamie,_

_The path ahead of you will have many dangers and many rewards. It is your world, but it has changed. You, my love, are a man of great courage and strength, and you will learn to live in this new place._

_I give you the last bit of my magic in this bag. Whatever you need you will find. Just think of me and reach inside it to find whatever you desire._

_I leave you with one last request – take care of my baby. He has lost his world and he needs you more than ever._

_In love forever,_

_Alivia._

Hook felt his throat catch as he read the letter, and then read it again. He could not believe that he had lost his Alivia, but he pushed that fear to the back of his mind as he looked around.

The houses were huge, great looming chunks of glass that went far up into the sky. People were all moving very fast and getting in and out of the boxes while talking to themselves. No one strolled along or exchanged pleasantries; no one was locked in stocks or getting whipped in the town square. He remembered ladies dressed in enormous gowns with their hair piled high under feathered hats with servant maids hurried beside them with umbrellas to shade their white faces from the sun. Here, all women were wearing men's trousers and seemed to be all colors of skin: white, tan, dark, blond hair, black hair, red hair – a few even had blue and pink.

And whereas men in Hook's time made way for ladies but expected servants to stay out of their way, here men walked by all women, ignoring them for the most part. A few people walked in groups, chatting to each other.

Though he felt extremely shocked and unnerved by all the changes, Hook pulled himself together to start walking. He looked different from everyone else. No one else wore fancy clothes with gold trim and brass buttons, no man had long hair or shoes with back heels, and no person spoke as he did.

He knew he had to get changed immediately. As long as he looked like the other people did, he stood a fair chance of blending in long enough to figure out a plan.

"A dressmaker," Hook whispered. "A dressmaker or even a tannery might have something I could wear."

Through tall glass windows, he spotted several bodies wearing clothes. For an awful second, he was sure that he looked upon white corpses with dead faces. But after a second look, he could see that the bodies were actually fake, not real even though they seemed very real. As Hook tried to ponder why anyone would ever put fake bodies up in a window, except maybe to frighten small children, one of the glass windows swung open to let a woman out. She was carrying several bags and talking to herself with one hand held up to her ear.

"I know, but I need these dresses. Tom spends all his time at the golf course and the kids are out of control, and if a few more clothes make me feel better about myself, then so be it."

She went off, still talking, but Hook grabbed the open window, which he realized was a door made of glass, and went into the building.

Clothes were in there – hanging from the walls and in bunches all over the floor and up on shelves, enough clothes for a whole village.

"Hi," a smiling woman came up to Hook, "Welcome to Gerry's Wear, clothes for the urban family. You look like you just came from a costume party."

Hook couldn't help glancing down to see that she wore black trousers, and he felt slightly unnerved that a woman would approach a man in such a forward manner.

"Um, yes," he gave her a polite nod, one meant for a lady of a much higher station. "Might I enquire about some clothing?"

She laughed. "Oh, this is too charming. Halloween's not for another week or two, but you're cute with the practice. I love British accents. What kind of clothes are you looking for? Casual? Business? Business casual? Sporting?"

"Whatever you think best," Hook smiled charmingly.

The woman lifted her eyebrows slightly. "What's your price range?"

Hook blinked again. He had no gold on him or any notes of wealth or promise. But he answered, "No range in price. Clothes enough for several days, perhaps even a week."

The woman smiled broadly. "My name is Maggie and I'll be glad to help you with whatever you need."

She took him back to a room and began bringing out garments for him to try on. The shirts were simple enough – most buttoned down the front and had buttons on the cuffs rather than cufflinks, and the collars were easier to manage. The trousers had an odd sliding thing that closed them up in the front, but Hook managed to tuck his shirt into the pants and fasten them up. He looked around for a cravat or embroidered collar to wear as the shirt looked very, very plain.

He had tied his long hair back with a strip of cloth from his coat, but he could tell that he would need to cut it off soon. In Neverland, it had grown out whether he cut it or not, but here on the earth it might stay cut.

"A few more items," Maggie stopped in the doorway. "My, don't you look handsome. Would you like to try on some ties?"

Hook looked at the narrow pieces of cloth she held. "Yes, indeed. Please assist me."

She came up close, close enough for him to see the flecks of green in her blue eyes. She pulled his collar up and looped a tie around his neck. Hook breathed softly as she twisted the tie into a knot and then folded down his collar.

"Quite nice," she smiled at their reflection in the mirror.

Hook barely recognized himself in the new clothes, but other than the long hair, he looked just like the man he had seen on the streets, all sharp lines of fabric that accented his arms, shoulders and chest while loose around his hips and legs.

"Beautiful," he gave her a nod of approval.

"Let me bring you some more," Maggie was grinning.

Much later, Hook stood at a counter while Maggie folded all the clothes and put them into bags. Hook had asked to wear the first clothes he tried on when he left, and she put his pirate clothes into a bag. Then she spent some time punching on an old shaped box that had green numbers which kept changing. Hook stared at the numbers, but they never seemed to be in a kind of order. 19.99, 12.99, 42.99, and so on.

"And with tax, that will be 1,278.56," Maggie told him. "How will you be paying, sir? Cash, check or charge?"

Hook froze, not knowing how to answer. He was holding the leather bag Alivia had left him, and he slipped his hand into it. "Help me, please," he asked silently.

He pulled out a small, hard card, about the size of a playing card but flat as a knife blade. It was a shiny green and blue with raised letters that spelled out _James Matthew Hook_.

"Oh, Visa? Thank you, Mr. Hook," Maggie took the card.

A few seconds later, she gave him a pen and told him to sign on narrow strips of paper. Hook took the pen and signed _Jas Hook_ on the paper. She handed him back the card and he slipped it into his leather bag. He wondered if the card acted like an I Owe You that a gentleman might write to another if the first gentleman were a bit low on money.

"Thank you, sir. Come back and see us," she handed him the handles of the six bags.

Hook took the bags, but paused to ask, "Forget me for asking a question about such a personal matter, but is there anywhere near here I could get a haircut?"

"Up the street on the right. Philian's, cuts for the business man.

Hook lugged his bags up the walk, wishing he had Smee there to carry for him. A captain should never have to tote his own luggage, but without the heavy coat, bulky hat, awkward sword, and uncomfortable boots, Hook found that he could walk much faster in his new clothes and shoes.

He got to Philian's without any trouble, and upon requesting a haircut, the barber agreed readily. Hook put all his bags in a nearby chair and sat down upon the leather seat where the barber pointed. Once seated, Hook was wrapped in a large cloth and the seat began to rise up.

"Decided to go corporate, eh?" the barber said as he began removing tools from drawers. "You'll never find a job with all that hair. You want a clean cut, very new millennia style?"

"Yes, indeed," Hook agreed.

Twenty minutes later, he was given a mirror to look at himself. His hair was short all over, but slightly longer on top. Without the length, it wasn't curly, and it seemed blacker than ever.

"You should get a shave too," the barber advised. "No boss man wants to see an applicant with scruff or a moustache or a goatee."

"Shave it all off," Hook agreed.

The barber did so and then accepted the flat card as payment.

"What now, what now?" Hook looked around the street. He now looked like the rest of the people, but he feared every time he opened his mouth that he would give himself away.

On the other side of the street, a burst of noise sounded above the roar of the moving boxes.

Hook saw several boys in their teens pushing at something in the center.

"He's crazy!" one boy shouted. "Hey, boy, say it again."

"Listen to this, listen to this," another jeered.

A big, burly boy stepped back, and in the center of the throng was a smaller dirty boy in rags.

"It's true," the small boy said. "I can fly. I will take you all to Neverland. I will! You have to believe – just believe and think happy thoughts. Tinkerbell? Where are you? I want to take you all to Neverland."

The boys started laughing, but Hook stood frozen as he stared at Peter on the ground, begging and crying. Peter didn't seem to notice him now that Hook looked so different, but he tried to grab onto the boys to get them to believe.

"All right, what's going on?" a man in different clothes came up. Hook didn't recognize what he was wearing, but judging from the man's stern expression, he had to be some kind of guard or sheriff.

The boys ran off as soon as the guard came up, but Peter lay on the sidewalk, wailing and blathering on and on about Neverland.

"There were fairies and a crocodile with a clock in his stomach and I flew everywhere and we played in the moonlight. The pirates were going to get me, but I come here sometimes. Here children used to visit, but no one leaves the window open anymore. Where are the Lost Boys? Why can't I find them?"

"What drugs did they give you?' the guard asked. "Where are your parents? Do you have a name?"

"Help me, help me get back," Peter's face was covered in dirt and tears. "Where are the mothers to take care of me? Where is my bunny? Minty! Come back to me. Where is Hook? He did this. Find Hook."

Another guard ran up and spoke in a low voice to the first guard. They agreed about something, because a few moments later, they pulled Peter up to his feet and dragged him, kicking and screaming, to a moving box parked on the side of the road. They put him in the back, and Hook was horrified to see that the windows of the moving box had bars on them, just like a cage. What kind of world was this that put children in cages?

The box started to roll forward on its thick wheels, and Peter beat on the bars, but Hook did not move. He couldn't think of a way to explain to the guards who he was and who Peter was. A second later, Hook wondered if he could have lied and explained that Peter was his son and the poor boy had gotten a bit lost, but that would hardly explain why he himself wore nice, new clothes and Peter wore ragged pirate garb that was too big for him.

He took a few long steps after Peter, but those horseless carriages moved much faster than a man could walk or run, and then it turned a corner and Hook lost sight of it.

"Think, man, think," he growled under his breath. "What should I do? I lost my ship, I lost my crew, and now I may lose my mind."

"Are you lost?" another guard appeared, a different one than those that had taken Peter.

"Is there an inn about here?" Hook asked. He felt it was a safe question – even in new times and places, people still had to sleep somewhere.

"Ah, so British," the guard laughed. "We call them hotels here in America. Yeah, there's a Marriott about a fourth mile down the road."

"Thank you," Hook said.

Once he got into the building marked Marriott, he went inside and walked directly to the people behind the counters. Already he had learned that people behind counters knew what they were doing.

"A room for the night? Gladly, sir," a woman with her hair in a bun began hitting her fingers on another weird box. "Just one?"

"Yes."

"Any particular floor or view?"

"No," Hook felt like a small schoolboy with all his limited answers. The magic buying card worked again, and then a teenage boy came up to take Hook's bags.

Rather than take Hook to the stairs, the boy took him to metal doors that suddenly pulled open. An empty closet was inside, and the boy motioned for them both to get inside. The doors shut themselves, and the boy stood still, looking down at the ground as they both stood in the closet. Hook felt extremely awkward – did the boy expect him to say something or do something? Perhaps the boy knew his secrets and this was all a trick to get him to confess.

Hook thought he felt the floor move a little, but that was silly. Floors didn't move except on a ship, and there was no water anywhere.

The doors opened, but what was outside looked completely different from what he had seen going in. He had stepped from a huge room with lots of seats and hanging chandeliers to a long hallway lined with doors.

"Ah!" Hook shouted in fear.

The boy jumped back. "What's wrong?"

"Uh, um, nothing, my lad. I just – just thought that I saw something. Lead on."

They went to a door which the boy opened, and Hook found himself in a spacious room with a large bed, table and chairs, and a large window that overlooked the city. The room was so high up that Hook, who usually had a good head for heights, felt a thrill of terror rush up his spine.

"Here you go, sir. Can I get you anything else?"

"Um, no," Hook reached into his bag, silently wishing for some sort of money to tip the boy, just like he had done years ago in England. He thought about the card, but so far everyone who had used it had slid it through the weird boxes and he doubted the boy had a box. Hook's fingers closed over a piece of paper, and he pulled out a greenish rectangle with the number five on it and a man's face.

"Thank you, sir," the boy put his hand out for the tip and took the paper.

Once he left, Hook began to explore the room, keeping several feet away from the huge window. He found the small bathing room off the bedroom and as he twisted knobs, water ran out of different spots in the room, into a small basin and a big one and at the bottom of what Hook guessed to be a privy seat.

"Why didn't people think of this years ago?" Hook shook his head.

Such a convenient place. Water at different temperatures to fill the big basin – a perfect place to give a sulky brat a bath. The smaller basin – a place to wash his hands and face before bed. The mirror above the sink was wide and clear, unlike the ones on the ship that had twisted and turned green everyone's reflection.

Hook took a moment to stare at himself: black hair short and wearing a white shirt and blue tie under a dark gray coat, clean shaven with his blue eyes crystal clear. He was still devilishly handsome, dark and lustful even after years on the cursed island. Styles may have changed, but he was still a man to be desired.

"I do believe the captain has arrived," he smiled wickedly.

------

"Can you find nothing on him?" Ms. Brante, a young social worker stepped into the observation room.

"No," Officer Jones shook his head. "The kid isn't in any of the systems. I even ran his prints – nothing. He keeps insisting that he's Peter Pan, like in the fairytales."

"Oh, so sad," she gazed through the glass of the one-way mirror.

"He got so violent that we thought he might hurt himself. It killed us to put him in there, but we didn't want to start medicating him before the doctors had a chance to examine him."

"It just breaks your heart," Ms. Brante sighed. "All the abuse these poor kids have in a world where no one cares."

On the other side of the glass, in a padded room, a small boy with blond hair sat on a chair. He wore white pants and no shoes. His arms were wrapped tight around him in a straightjacket that tied behind his back.

Peter lifted his face up as a single tear rolled down. "Hook," his voice was barely more than a whisper, "where are you?"


	2. Adaptations

AN: Thanks to Fawkes Song for betaing.

H&H&H&H&H&H&H&H&H

"No, no, no," Peter shook his head as two men in white came into his room. "Go away, go away!"

"Calm down, kid," one man soothed. "The doctor is going to help you now."

Another man entered, wearing a white coat and dark pants.

"I'm not sick," Peter tried to free his arms from the confining clothes. He couldn't move his arms, and the helplessness of his situation caused his eyes to fill with tears. "I don't want medicine. It's yucky. Let me go. I want to fly home."

"I'm Dr. Mills and these are two orderlies who will help me take care of you," the man said quietly. "We're going to put you on this bed here," he motioned to the gurney that one of the orderlies brought in, "and we're going to run a few tests on you. We want to figure out who your parents are."

"I don't have parents!" Peter screamed. "No, no, no!"

He tried to kick, but the orderlies had picked him up (one scooping under his torso and the other grabbing at his flaying legs) and laid him on the gurney. They strapped him down, and Peter couldn't move his body at all. The tears came pouring down, but the men just gave him sympathetic looks and didn't offer to help free him.

The gurney was on wheels, and Peter found himself wheeled out of the room. Bright lights shone from the ceiling above, but he couldn't move other than to shut his eyes tight and turn his head to the side.

They brought him to another room, and the men untied one of his arms. Peter thought he would be allowed to get up, but the world turned ugly as the men, rather than release him, drove a sharp needle into his arm.

Peter yanked away, thrashing his arm free as he bawled and let out one sob after another at the cruelty.

"This isn't going to work," Dr. Mills wore a grim expression. "He's going to hurt himself, and we can't reason with him. Give him a sedative and then draw blood. I want an MRI done, to look for brain damage. Watch him closely for allergic reactions to any medications."

"Let me up, let me up," Peter begged. "Please, I shouldn't be here. I was being good on the ship, but then it disappeared. My bunny's gone, too. I can't find anyone, and I can't fly. I want to fly again. Let me fly home."

"Calm down," one of the orderlies said as the other one went to the medication cabinet. "No one's going to hurt you. You're safe here. Shh, calm down and don't fight us. Good grief, kid, what happened to you? What did someone do to you?"

"He promised nothing bad would happen to me," Peter blinked, sending tears down his red cheeks. "He saved me from the darkness and the dying trees and he said he wouldn't let them hurt me if I did what he said."

"Hold him still," the other orderly came over, the loaded syringe behind his back. "We're going to give you something to help you feel better."

Before Peter could react, both men had grabbed his right arm and pinned it to the gurney. Then the needle was shoved down, and Peter screamed as the medicine went into him, making his whole arm ache. They finally pulled the needle out, and Peter tried to suck in enough air to scream again, but he felt dizzy and short of breath. He wheezed hard, trembling from the shock, but the men just watched him, their faces blank.

Peter kept crying for a few minutes, but after a while, he couldn't remember why he was crying. The tears felt cold to his face, and he wondered how he came to be in the bright room, all tied down. His eyelids felt very heavy, but he didn't want to sleep. He wished his body were free so he could turn on his side and curl up.

His limbs felt heavy and useless. He wondered how he was ever able to fly and swordfight and be the bestest boy in the whole universe. As the fog settled around him, thick and peaceful, he thought he would like nothing more than to hold his bunny and sit in someone's lap and have them pet his hair as he petted his bunny. He could be someone's bunny; if he scrunched up his nose and nuzzled up with his arms and legs tucked underneath him, he could pretend to be a bunny, and Hook might keep him in a crate and feed him food and pet him and call him "Good bunny."

"Five more minutes and we can start," the first orderly said, watching Peter's glazed eyes.

"The medicine took effect pretty quickly," the other noted. "That's good. It means that whoever had him before didn't abuse him with drugs or stimulants or alcohol."

They loosened his other arm, but Peter didn't try to escape. He gave them a small smile as his eyes half-closed and the orderlies split into four men, four white angels in a white room with lots of lights but no pain anywhere.

H&H&H&H&H&H&H&H&H

In the few hours that followed, Hook learned more about the new world and its changes than he had ever thought possible. By complete accident, he had stepped on a piece of black wood and the box on top of the dresser turned all different colors and people started moving inside it.

Hook at first crouched behind the bed, waiting to fight the demons that would fly out of the box like monstrous fairies, but the people stayed in the box. Then they disappeared and new people moved in the box.

When it became apparent that the box wasn't letting the people out, Hook went to stare at the box, sitting on the edge of the bed and watching rapturously. It was like looking at a moving painting, paintings that said words and had music though Hook never saw any musical instruments. The people talked to each other, but sometimes they talked to him, and Hook felt uncomfortable as to whether or not he should answer them.

"Do you sometimes have trouble engaging in sexual activities?" a woman with a pleasant smile asked.

"Never, and it's none of your concern," Hook snapped at the box.

"Three out of four men experience frequent difficulty in sustaining sexual activity," the woman kept smiling.

"They do?" Hook blinked. "Who are these men? Peasants? Noblemen? Kings?"

The woman started talking about a long word that Hook had never heard of before, but after a few minutes, he realized she was talking about medicine.

"You're nothing more than a street vendor," Hook scoffed. "Some kind of medicine show run by a quack who takes our money and gives us dried herbs in return. Go away – I'm not interested."

She finally left, and then people were sitting down at a table and talking with blank voices about horrible things happening: fires, shootings, war, and school safety. Hook took them to be some kind of modern-day criers that reported on the conditions of the town. Clearly the town was under attack because one problem followed another. They showed awful pictures of horrific events happening, but each time Hook glanced out the window, nothing was happening in the streets.

Hook finally grabbed the paper beside the bed – so smooth and thin unlike the rough parchment he was used to. The small stick beside it was a pen that magically produced ink without having to dip the tip in an ink-pot. Hook began scribbling notes down about everything the box told him.

The day wore on into afternoon, and Hook kept writing. The criers left and then people were moving around without talking to him, but Hook realized that it was some kind of play they were putting on. They talked about things he didn't understand, but he wrote them down. The play kept getting interrupted by the vendors who tried to sell everything from food to clothes to something called fast internet service, but he took notes on all of it as well. He thought the vendors rather silly; none of them told him how to get any of the wares, just that he should have them. The vendors also featured people dancing and performing tricks around food and children's toys, acting so erratic that Hook thought most parents would keep such food and toys away from children just so they didn't act crazy.

The box refused to stop; it kept going, showing more and more people. By late afternoon, Hook was exhausted and starving. He picked up the odd contraption that the box had called a phone and started pushing buttons. He heard several voices inside, but they advised him to hang up and call the front desk. He managed that, and a pleasant voice asked how she could help him.

"I'm hungry," Hook said bluntly.

"Certainly, sir. Room service can bring you anything off the menu."

Hook found the menu – a thick piece of paper describing the food. He asked for five different items, and the voice promised that she would send the food up shortly.

Fifteen minutes later, the food came up on trays, more dishes than Hook could ever eat at once. He placed the food on various flat tops throughout the room and began eating, still watching the box. The food tasted different. Not bad, but not the usual fare they had on the ship. He couldn't eat more than two plates, but he resolved to save the rest for later in case the phone stopped working.

By the time the sun sank that evening, Hook had discovered other information as well. A button on the wall turned on fire in the ceiling which didn't give out heat but provided plenty of light. The stiff cards the people had given him would lock and unlock his door (he learned this watching people do it as they walked up and down the hall and went into rooms.) The box would change if he pushed the knobs on the black piece of wood, and new moving people and plays would come on again. The black wood also controlled how loud the box got, and he could make them whisper if he wanted. The box was called a TeeVee, and apparently lots of them were on sale at different places.

In this new age, information was key – of that, Hook felt absolutely certain. He would have to know about everything before he could venture out and try to act like he belonged in the world. The possibilities seemed endless in this new world, information that went on and on with no end in sight. Back in his day, he had been a fairly educated man before he turned to pirating. The fact that he could read and write and cipher through long sheets of numbers had earned him the respect of all his illiterate crew. He was the voice of reason on his ship, the intelligent mind amidst a bunch of savages, the father figure to a hoard of unruly grown children.

In his more blasphemous moments at sea, Hook had taken to reading lines of scripture, but adding in his own verses about respecting the pirate lords. He had invented a whole new chapter in Corinthians that dealt with damnation of pirates who mutinied against their captain. Stealing several images from Dante's Inferno, Hook had described the torments that mutineers would suffer in hell. He read that chapter aloud every so often, usually in his private cabin with one or two candles lit to cast a red glow on his face as he warned his pirates of treason. Even the most hardened pirate had been suitably impressed, trembling with fear and crossing himself fervently.

But here in the new world, no one seemed superstitious or really scared of anything. From what the TeeVee indicated, most people could read and speak correct grammar. Rather than fearing damnation, they all seemed more concerned with talking to each other and wearing clothes and riding around in the fast boxes that they called cars. He would have to be extra clever to navigate this world, and that meant knowing everything about it that he could find.

Hook had filled up the pieces of paper and was working on the backside of the sheets when exhaustion came over him. He lay back on the bed, falling to sleep as the TeeVee kept going, even without anyone watching.

H&H&H&H&H&H&H&H&H

"Any change?" Ms. Brante adjusted her glasses as she came to the doorway of the room and looked through the glass.

"No," Dr. Mills shook his head, "the medication helps to calm him, but once it wears off, he turns psychotic again."

She shook her head. Further into the white room, the boy was in bed, his wrists and ankles secured with soft, but confining restraints. She opened her electronic notepad. "I've run his face, fingerprints, and DNA through all our systems, but nothing has come up. I've marked him as a John Doe, but I think his first name is Peter. Age could be anywhere from nine to twelve. No signs of abuse except those that were self-inflicted."

"He's healthy other than that," the doctor sighed. "His blood is bizarre, though. He hasn't had any of his immunizations, none of them. He's not immune to smallpox, measles, mumps, polio, or even the chicken pox. Even if he didn't get any of these shots, he would have gotten a little immunity from his mother, father, or grandparents. Even third world countries would have some kind of immunization against small pox. And he's white and speaks English with a slight British accent so I can't tell where exactly he was raised and not given any kind of medical treatment."

Ms. Brante bit her lip in puzzlement. "You think he was raised in captivity? Some kind of cult or sex traders that deal in human trafficking?"

"No sign of injury," Dr. Mills shook his head. "He has the normal scars that a boy his age might have from playing outside and climbing and falling out of trees, but nothing past that. Nothing to indicate the psychological turmoil he's experiencing now."

"Most children who exhibit such signs of stress have suffered severe abuse," Ms. Brante pushed her glasses up on her nose. "It's incredible the amount of suffering people can give children. You wouldn't believe some of the cases I've handled. The number of sadists in the world is quite alarming."

Silence lapsed between them, then the doctor spoke,

"We couldn't get him to eat anything so we put a feeding tube down his throat after we sedated him again. We also have an IV giving him fluids. We can keep him that way until you're ready to move him."

"We'll need psychological evaluations beyond what I've seen," Ms. Brante replied. "If he doesn't show improvement and we can't get to the bottom of his problems, I'll sign off on a transfer to a mental institution."

"I hate to see him go there," Dr. Mills sighed. "He's just a kid – seems like he should get a shot at a normal life. He should be playing with friends and going to school and arguing with parents about staying up too late, not drugged and tied down here."

"Sometimes these things happen," Ms. Brante's voice was still even. "Sometimes you can't save someone, no matter how much you'd like to play the hero. If he can't be happy and healthy, he can be put some place where he can't hurt himself or others."

Inside the room, Peter stared up at the ceiling, tilting his head to each side to make it spin around. He tried to shut his mouth, but he couldn't close his teeth together because a plastic tube got in the way. He would have pulled it out of his mouth, but his hands were gathered up neatly to his sides. It didn't really matter because he couldn't move his hands if he wanted to. They could cut off his hands, and he wouldn't care because he didn't need hands.

He closed his eyes and enjoyed the sleepy feeling that drew him down into the bed. With his eyes closed, he could pretend, let his imagination run free without anyone to tell him no.

There was a house made out of a ship, perched on the edge of a green meadow. He could run through the fields and laugh as he played tag with butterflies. He would rise above the fields, not quite flying, but hovering there with the butterflies. The sun felt warm to his face, soaking heat into his hair.

Inside the ship house, Hook was waiting for him, directing someone to cook dinner, and eventually Hook would come looking for him. "You naughty boy," Hook would scold, "dinner's almost cold. Thank goodness I'm here to take care of you – you'd be lost without me."

Peter would go into the house where he was taken care of, scolded, made to behave, but above all loved. Inside the house someone loved him; someone cared about what happened to him. He belonged there. He couldn't be hurt there.

He imagined going through the dinner and then being put to bed, this time with Minty snuggled by his side while Hook told him a story and then warned him not to get out of bed until morning. Rather than start the next day in the ship house, Peter went back to the field where he played in the sun with the butterflies while Hook was inside.

The sequence played out in his head, over and over again. Each time, it felt more real, and he could almost taste the dinner and hear Hook's voice, deep but caring.

Peter didn't stir as the night grew dark outside. The IV machine beeped softly every so often, indicating that it was slowly dripping fluids and sedatives into his veins, ensuring that he wouldn't move until morning.


	3. Technology

The next day Hook went out. He took the magic bag and the flat cards that let him in and out of the hotel room. He wore the clothes he had seen the men on the TeeVee wear: a long-sleeved shirt and dark trousers and dark shoes. Down the hall, it took him a few minutes to figure out how the closet in the wall worked. He stood casually in the hallway, watching people get into the closet and the doors open and shut like magic. The people were gone the next time the doors opened, and Hook figured that the closet lifted up and down depending on how people pushed the buttons that lit up.

He waited until he was alone and got in the closet. The doors shut, but nothing happened.

"Closet down?" he said.

Nothing happened.

"Confusing world," Hook muttered under his breath as he glanced around. Seeing more buttons, he started pushing all of them. One made the doors open, but the other made the doors shut. He felt the whole thing move up and the doors opened to another hallway, one like the floor he was on, but different.

After going up and down, and opening to reveal all sorts of hallways, the doors finally opened to reveal a big open room where he had been before. Doing his best to look very nonchalant, Hook walked up to the desk.

"Hello, sir," the woman behind it smiled. "Enjoying your stay?"

"Yes, I am," Hook kept his face blank. "Perhaps could you give me directions to roam 'round this fine city of yours?"

The woman laughed. "Oh, so charming. Our concierge is out right now, but I can give you a map."

She brought out a piece of paper and laid it on the table. "We are here," she marked an X on one spot. "And here is a row of excellent restaurants. Here is a sports center, a museum, a shopping mall, and a tourist bus that can take you all around."

She circled various places on the map.

"There isn't a spot that marks a treasure, is there?" Hook tried his hand at humor.

"Are you a pirate?" the woman looked at him, tilting her head in a slightly flirtatious manner.

"I might be," Hook reached down by his side, but there was no sword there.

"Then you'll find lots of company," the woman teased. "This city is full of pirates. Have fun."

She handed him the map, and Hook took it, confused but feeling confident that he could navigate with a map in hand.

Three hours later, Hook sank in a chair in a small corner of something called Wendy's and looked at the food on a tray. Rather than made of silver or brass, this tray was a weird brown color and felt too smooth. He had copied the other customers and ordered something called a number 3 and when asked what to drink, he had requested tea.

The food was wrapped up and the tea came in a cup bigger than his hand. He removed the top only to find ice floating in the top. He sipped the tea.

Disgusting. It was freezing cold, too sweet, and barely tasted like tea.

Hook looked around to see if the other patrons were furious as well, if there might be a revolt over the awful tea, but no one seemed upset. They were all eating. Apparently, in the new world, no one cared much about what was served to them or how it was served. Here everyone seemed capable of getting their own food without servants to wait on them.

The food tasted weird, but not in a bad way. Hook ate it slowly. There was some kind of pile of food – bread, vegetables, and meat – and long sticks of things that kind of tasted like potatoes. It wasn't bad, but it was all a matter of comparison. In England, the food had always been rotting and bland. On the island, the food was fresh, but it was always the same thing and it never mattered if he ate or not because one couldn't starve himself in Neverland. Here, he could get used to the food if he had to.

As he ate, he looked out the window, carefully memorizing everything he had seen. There had been more to learn outside of the inn room. The city teemed with life, but no one really spoke to him, and he had to be careful not to get hit by the cars. The buildings went on forever, but Hook paid careful attention to his map, never losing his spot. He had a goal to make it back to the inn without asking for directions, proving himself the best navigator of all time.

When he went back outside, the cars were still driving by, and he had a suspicion that they never stopped going by. The cars would stop at the changing circles of light, and when they stopped, Hook could cross the street. He made sure other people were walking before he started; he felt like the cars would like an excuse to run him over.

He had turned around a corner and thought about going into one of the buildings when he heard a beggar on the side of the road.

"Alams. Alams for the poor. Tuppence will do."

Hook glanced over and to his shock he saw Smee huddled against the side of the building, holding out a hand and looking generally pathetic.

"Smee?" Hook raised an eyebrow.

The smaller man looked at him and burst into tears. "Oh, cap'n, it's the cap'n. Thank the saints, the cap'n is here. I'm saved – saved!"

"Shh," Hook cautioned, seeing people starting to glance in their direction. "Quiet down. Where have you been these last days?"

"Down on me luck," Smee looked at the ground in exhaustion. "Lost in this new hell, wandering and begging, but barely making enough to get a mouthful of food. The guards have run me off, told me to move along, but now you're here, cap'n. You'll save us all."

"Is the rest of the crew about?" Hook looked down the street.

"Not that I've seen. I don't understand. I went to bed in me hammock last night like always, but when I woke, I was in this strange place. I thought I was dreaming. I can't wake up, cap'n – I can't wake up!"

"Hush," Hook ordered. "This isn't a dream. We're back in the real world, but we've been gone so long it's changed. Get up from that stupid position and come with me. I'll get you some new clothes."

"You're so good to us," Smee was practically fawning.

On the way back to the inn, Hook realized that his bo'sun was indeed as stupid as Hook had always believed. No matter what he explained to the smaller man, Smee stared in confusion and nodded without really understanding what was going on. They bought clothes based on the advice of another shop girl, but Smee had no clue of what to do.

Once back at the inn, Hook requested another room next to his, and when the woman asked how long they would need the rooms, Hook told her a week. Meanwhile Smee stared in wonder at the lobby and shrieked when the closet doors closed.

"Stop it," Hook growled as they got inside. "Stop looking amazed at everything. This world is normal for them, just like our world was normal for us when we lived there. We didn't gasp at the sight of a castle when we saw it. Pretend like all this is normal."

"But it's not," Smee sighed. The closet doors opened, and Smee saw the hallway instead of the lobby and he shook his head. "Not natural, it is. Haunted place – black magic."

"Idiot," Hook grabbed him by the arm and pulled him forward. "The closet goes up and down. Couldn't you figure that out? People are too important to walk up stairs – they want moving closets."

He went to the door beside his room, checking that the number on the door and the number on the new card matched. He slid the card in, and the door clicked, and he opened the handle.

"Not right," Smee shook his head. "Beastly, evil place."

"It's a room," Hook let the door shut behind them. "Let me show you around. Then you can take a shower and get some food. They bring it up right away."

Smee was able to understand almost everything in the room – Hook didn't turn on the TeeVee – but the bathroom proved another surprise.

"A water-fountain in two places," Smee backed up. "Water that comes out of the wall on its own, without a pump for you to push – darkest magic."

"Maybe, but convenient," Hook pushed him into the bathroom. "Clean up, put on the clothes we bought, and come to my room when you're done. Stop crying like a child or I'll beat you when you're done."

He left Smee sniffling in the bathroom, and Hook went back to his room. The room had been cleaned up while he was gone, and he guessed that the inn must have some kind of servants even though he never saw them. He turned the TeeVee back on and studied it intently.

After a while, he heard Smee call from the hallway, "Cap'n? Cap'n, where are you? All the doors are the same. Oh, fresh hell, and me just a poor pirate. Me punishment for neglecting church and swearing twice on Sundays. Oh –"

Hook rolled his eyes as he headed for the door. He was cursed with idiots.

H&H&H&H&H

"Just look at it one more time," Dr. Mills encouraged. "Tell me what you see there."

Peter slowly looked back at the picture. They had him propped in a chair, and they had taken all the restraints off him, leaving him in gray clothes that felt warm though he couldn't feel much else. He was sleepy, and his limbs felt heavy. He wanted to move, and at the back of his mind, he felt that he should be trying to escape though he didn't know why.

"Look at the picture," the doctor prompted again.

Peter stared at the colors on the paper, trying his best to please the man. Usually he didn't want to please adults – he had never wanted to please adults – but now he couldn't remember why.

"Do you see the picture?"

Peter nodded. He did see the picture.

"What is in the picture?" the doctor asked.

The shapes were odd, but Peter focused. What could the shapes be? What did they look like?

"I don't know," he said in a voice that didn't sound like himself at all.

"Can you guess?" the doctor's voice was quiet and gentle. "Just take a guess what they might be. If this square here is a door, what could the rest of it be?"

Peter stared at the brown square. If it was a door . . . the shapes were moving into focus . . . they didn't look so strange . . .

"A house?" he whispered, not moving his lips.

"That's right," the doctor nodded. "It's a house. Do you know who lives in a house?"

Peter shook his head.

"Do people live in a house?" the doctor asked, smiling a little.

Peter nodded. For some reason, his chest ached suddenly, and he hated that he felt so sad.

"That's right, people live in a house," Dr. Mills went on. "Did you ever live in a house? Did you live with people in a house?"

"No," Peter swallowed hard.

"Did you live in an apartment? In a hotel room? In a car? Maybe you lived outside?"

"I lived in a tree," Peter felt the pain press down on his throat. "Then I lived on a ship."

"Were you brought here illegally? Did your family have to hide to get here?"

"I don't have any family," Peter lowered his head. "Everyone left me – the girls, the lost boys, the fairies, the pirates. I'm all alone now."

A tightness wrapped around his chest, and Peter struggled to breathe.

"Peter, I want you to put your hands up on the table," the doctor instructed. "Palms down. Good boy. I'm going to go out for a second, but you're going to stay in here. You're going to close your eyes and then think of a place where you'd like to be."

"Think happy thoughts?" Peter shook his head. "That doesn't work here. I can't fly without the fairy dust."

"I know. You can't fly. But you can think of a happy place. Close your eyes and think of a happy place."

Obediently, Peter shut his eyes and returned to the field where he was playing. The field beside the house where Hook lived, the field where the sun shone, and the birds were singing, and everything was happy and sweet, and he wasn't alone.

"Sad," Dr. Mills said to Ms. Brante on the other side of the one-way mirror. "Completely broken. Everything he says is from the Peter Pan fairytale. Obviously someone read him the book as a kid or he saw one of the movies, and he's attached himself to it in order to survive."

"Chance of adjustment?" Ms. Brante asked. "Chance that he could be healed and function as a normal boy?"

"Slim," the doctor picked up another set of papers. "Personality Disorder, persistent amnesia, inability to regulate himself without medication, and violent outbursts. The whole nine yards, and he's only been here two days."

"Do you think we could get more out of him without the drugs?" Ms. Brante asked. "Just for a little while?"

"We can't risk him harming himself or someone else. I'll gradually lessen the medication and replace it with anti-depressants, anti-anxiety, and anti-psychotics. Once we find something that works, we keep him on the medication and start therapy."

"Poor thing," Ms. Brante looked through the mirror into the room where Peter sat with his hands on the desk and his eyes shut, "he's never going to be all right."

"No, but with enough work, he might not have to be institutionalized."

Ms. Brante glanced at the doctor, but she could see the doubt in his eyes. Her own gaze was calm as she looked at the boy, and the glass reflected back to her the face of a woman who had seen too many tragedies to care too deeply anymore.

H&H&H&H&H

"They show you things on the TeeVee," Hook explained, "but you have to go to the store to buy them. You can order stuff off something called the internet which you get with something called a computer. These computers are everywhere – I saw people using them in small taverns – and you have to have one to live here these days."

Smee was busy stuffing his mouth with food, but he pretended to nod along.

"They have things called movies that you go to see in special theaters, like you would watch a play, only it's all flat and the actors aren't really there. Lord, but there is tons to learn about this new world. I have to get out there, Smee. I have to conquer this new place."

"Be careful, cap'n," Smee said. "There's new devilry in this world."

"Don't be stupid. This world isn't about the devil. It's about speed and machines and cars and something called cell phones with unlimited minutes. Unlimited minutes – something that lets you live forever, I guess. I want that, Smee. I want unlimited minutes. I want power in this new world. It's so much cleaner than the old one was, and people are smarter. Everyone can read and write."

"I can't," Smee sighed.

"I know, but here you're expected to. Words are everywhere – on signs and pictures and there are tons of books and newspapers. You can't survive without it. People have all their teeth and they don't reek and they wear clothes without holes. They don't dump waste in the streets and they don't have pigs rutting in the mud everywhere. There's no mud anywhere. This world is incredible, and I want to be powerful here."

Smee looked small and pitiful, and he avoided looking at the TeeVee which had frightened him when Hook turned it on.

"I want to drive one of those cars," Hook went on. "I want to have a computer. I want to work at one of those places," he pointed to the TeeVee, "where there are no windows and everyone sits at different desks and one man gets to be called the boss. I want to be that boss – they have to do whatever he says. Bosses are the captains of the new world."

"But we don't know enough about the new world," Smee protested.

"Not yet, but I can learn," Hook smirked. "I learned about the old world and that cursed island. This place is bigger and much more complicated, but I've never backed down from a challenge."

"But then what, cap'n?" Smee asked. "You learn everything and then what?"

"We live here and master everything. I'll find Peter eventually. Alivia gave me this," Hook held up the enchanted bag, "and she wants me to find him eventually. He's her son."

"What?" Smee nearly fell out of his chair.

"Yes," Hook sneered, "my love married someone else, and the brat is hers. He left her as a small child and went to live with the fairies and left her heart broken. All those years, and I had Alivia's son on the island with me. Insolent brat, leaving her, abandoning her, making her cry. When I get my hands on him –"

Hook's eyes flashed, and Smee drew back. "Now, now, cap'n, first things first."

"Indeed. I need to – wait –" Hook turned to the TeeVee intently.

"Have you ever wanted to learn how to further your career with the help of technology?" a voice said through the TeeVee as the picture of people sitting at the computer flashed across the screen. "In two weeks, ITT Tech can revolutionize your life by giving you computer instructions that will make you invaluable in today's fast-paced world. Call the number below for more information."

"That's it," Hook lunged for the phone. "My first step into the modern world. Let them see how fast-paced I can be."

Smee hunched over his food, eating and trying to look as small as possible. He was not ready for the new world or its fast pace.


	4. Speed

The next six days saw Hook busier than he ever remembered being. He called the technical school but after careful counseling, they recommended a computer beginner's course that would help him learn the functions of the strange machines that everyone seemed to use.

Each day, every hour – there was something new to learn. Money was all paper now, and not individual bank notes, but green and uniform with strange markings on both sides. He found he could insert the plastic cards into a machine called an ATM, and it spit out paper money at him in hundreds and fifties. Money could buy everything, but tax still existed. There were no annoying tax collectors, but everyone seemed content to buy the fees when the nice people behind the small machines asked.

Hook had rather enjoyed the days when tax collectors were threatened and the sheriff had to appear to quell angry mobs, but this new system seemed to run without a lot of hitches. Food and clothes and other things could be purchased with paper money or cards, and everyone bought them without causing a fuss.

There were so many stops now, too. Enormous buildings, as big as Saint Paul's Cathedral in London, but not for cowering in fear before God. No, in huge buildings, lots of people strolled up and down narrow passages of things for sale and pulled metal carts to choose what they wanted. Most of the doors to the shops opened once Hook got near, and though he had suspected witchcraft at first, soon he learned that some doors opened by themselves and some didn't. He had to wait and see for each door and watch other people, of course.

Most of the day was spent copying other people, imitating what they did in stores and tavern-like places for food. Hook copied their bored look, the way they seemed so impatient in a world that moved so fast.

On day two, Hook went to a store filled with something called electronics and bought a flat thing called a laptop. After five hours working on it and nearly smashing it in frustration, Hook got it plugged into the wall and running. He read the entire booklet that came with it, and while he didn't understand a great deal of it, he marked the parts he understood and studied the pictures intently.

On day three, he went to the beginner's class and took his laptop with him. He sat in the front row, wrote down everything the teacher, a pretty woman in a scandalously short skirt, said and kept his mouth shut. Once he figured out more, he would ask more, but he was stuck in the early stages now – like a child trying to learn all about the new world.

"Thank you immensely," he told the teacher at the end of the class. "Your information was invaluable."

She gave a short laugh. "Oh, well, thank you. You have a charming accent. British?"

"Always," Hook smiled. "With your fair looks and shapely form, you would have been a duchess in the old world."

"Please, Mr. Hook," she blushed, "I'm your teacher. That's hardly appropriate."

But she was flattered and liked him. Hook bowed his head graciously and took his leave.

On day four, following his teacher's instructions, Hook got on the internet. He spent the next thirty-four hours staring at the screen and reading everything he could about the new world. The hotel delivered food and Smee begged him to go out and get a breath of air, but Hook kept reading until he fell into an exhausted slumber where the information pulsed out at him through the screen of the laptop and chased him through dreams.

On day six, Hook learned to drive.

Equipped with his trusty pistol hidden in the pocket of his new suit, Hook made his way to a yellow car, a taxi, which was driven around cities to take people places that didn't have cars. Cars were things that ran on something called gasoline, but gasoline was expensive and a lot of places on the internet were complaining about the high cost.

Apparently, no matter when one lived, everyone was complaining about something. Piracy was still running strong, but in his hours of internet reading, Hook kept finding that people were stealing flat things called DVDs and they didn't look like they were made of gold. But people stole them and the authorities were upset, which Hook thought was ridiculous. Of course, piracy upset the people in charge. It was piracy!

But he charged with confidence to the yellow car and pulled on the handle the way he had seen other people do. The car door opened, and the man inside looked up.

"Hey, man, whatcha doin'?"

Hook pointed the gun in his face.

"Okay, okay!" the driver put his hands up. "You can have the car."

"I don't want the car," Hook told him briskly.

The driver blinked. "Okay, English dude, you can have my money."

"I don't want your money – I have plenty of money," Hook declared. "Move over to the other side."

The driver slid into the other seat, and Hook got into the empty seat. The car looked different from the inside, but Hook shut the door. "You're going to teach me how to drive."

"What?" the driver shrieked.

"I wish to learn to drive this car. You know how to drive this car. Therefore, you should be able to teach me how to drive this car."

"You don't know how to drive a car?"

"I know many things, good sir. Most of them center on commanding a ship. But where I come from, we don't have cars. I would have moved much faster in a car if I had had one. Horses are slower and smell much worse."

"Is this a bit for America's Funniest Home Videos?" the driver asked.

"I don't know what that is, but I will discover it soon," Hook promised. "Now, teach me how to drive this car. If you don't, I shall shoot, hurl you from this car, and drive it myself."

"What?"

"I learned to operate a computer," Hook announced triumphantly. "A car may be bigger, but I don't see any classes being offered for them."

"Of course there are driving classes. Kids take them all the time."

"They allow a little child to drive this big thing?" Hook blinked.

"Well, no, man, but they let them once the kids are sixteen."

"Well, that makes sense," Hook nodded. "By sixteen, a man can marry and become a full sailor. But I am older than sixteen and do not wish to learn with anyone that age. I'm going to drive this car and you will assist me."

The driver glanced outside as if to consider waving for help, and Hook noticed for the first time the letters and numbers below the window.

"You take money to let people ride in here," Hook realized. "Like a post coach. Oh, I've been doing this all wrong. Do you want money to let me drive this car? Is that better?"

The driver hesitated. "Ah – how much money?"

Hook reached into his pocket and pulled out a handful of hundreds. "I've seen that cars cost many thousands of these things you call dollars, but surely a few hundred would permit me to drive this machine. Would four hundred suffice?"

The driver held out his keys. "Put the gun away. You'll need both hands to drive."

Driving a car was more difficult than steering a ship or riding a horse. There were two things for Hook to push with his feet, and he had to remember which was which, and the fact that the driver kept screaming did not help Hook's concentration.

"Oh, we're going to die!" the driver hollered as Hook pulled the car into the four-lane road.

"We most certainly are not," Hook clutched the wheel with both hands. "I've come this far and I will not – good heavens, what is that infernal noise? It's like a bunch of geese squawking."

"It's horns!" the driver cried. "People are honking at you."

"Are they?" Hook felt surprised. "What does it mean?"

"It means for you to get the hell out of the way. You're only going fifteen miles an hour."

"That sounds quite fast. At that speed, one could go from Warwick to Hampton Court in just –"

"Step on the gas pedal! No, that's the brake. It slows you down. The other one. Stomp on it."

Hook desperately hit the petal as hard as he could, and the car went so fast he could barely breathe.

The next few minutes were agonizing as Hook tried not to hit other cars and the driver kept swearing at him. But after a bit, Hook began to get the hang of it. Pressing down on the gas in different ways made the car go faster or slower. The other pedal slowed the car until it stopped altogether. The white lines on the road were for keeping all the cars going straight, but other cars were allowed to turn off on side roads or come onto Hook's road.

It was so much neater than the dirt lanes and alleys of his world. Back then, mud and ruts had slowed traffic, and everyone wandered and pushed, and carts had to stop for the lord's carriage and be careful not to run over little children. Accidents and broken wheels were a normalcy there; dogs were often hit and limped on three legs; cats dashed across alleys only to get smashed. The poorer people would take the dead animals to make nasty stew, and the remains would get thrown into the street along with human waste, mud, dish water, and threadbare rags.

But this kind of movement, in this fast car – Hook felt excitement pump in his veins as he pushed the car faster and faster.

"Slow down!" the driver screamed, sounding like a little girl more every moment. "This ain't no Fast and the Furious. You're going to get us all killed."

"I will have you keel-hauled if you don't stop blubbering," Hook said in his best captain's voice. "You will conduct yourself appropriately, even though you are from the servant class, and tell me why there are so many sizes of cars on this road."

"Different cars are for different things. Jeez, man, what century are you from?"

"None of your concern," Hook was crisp. "Now, I would like to know what all these knobs and buttons are for. May I touch them or are they for a crew to maintain such as jibs and bowlines?"

"Look out!" the driver yelled, and Hook had to twist the wheel sharply to avoid hitting a car that was as big as a cottage and felt it could take up half the road.

He drove for over an hour, and when he finally got out, he had to pay the man a thousand dollars because the driver was hysterical and kept threatening to go to the police.

"You will behave yourself," Hook said as he gave the paper money to the driver, "or I will be forced to have the sheriff take you to the asylum. You don't want to go there, now, do you?"

"You belong in an asylum," the driver yelled. He slammed his door and drove off, leaving Hook to call,

"If you were a proper gentleman, I'd challenge you to a duel for that."

The driver shoved his hand out the window and closed down all the fingers of his hand except the middle one.

"Quite an odd servant class," Hook mused as he walked back to the hotel. "These folks used to have gumption and spirit. A servant lass of twelve could out-drink a grown lady any day. These servants are quite too soft and easily scared."

He returned back to his room, took a refreshing bath, and then went to the computer to learn about all the words he had learned while on his exhilarating drive.

Smee had not had as glorious a time as his captain. The poor short man spent his days in the hotel room, leaving only when the cleaning servants came to tidy up. Smee would huddle in a corner of the lobby until Hook returned, and nothing could induce the smaller man to go outdoors without Hook.

"You have to stop being such a coward," Hook roared at him on the sixth night over marvelous chicken roasted a warm brown and covered with sweet sauce. "We figured out the island. Now we have this world to figure out. Once we do, we can go find the boy."

"Then what, capt'n?" Smee took off his spectacles and wiped them with his napkin.

"Then we'll find a ship and get back to pirating. Or whatever is real pirating in this world. I don't want to steal those DVD things. I saw some in a shop today. They look like books, but they don't have pages inside, just thin round plates. Stop sniveling and eat."

"Too much food," Smee sighed. "Eating all this and not a bit of rum in sight to ease the pain. Oh, I wish I were dead."

"Keep up that caterwauling, and I'll make your wish come true," Hook threatened. "You've done nothing but whine since we got here. I will find a good whip somewhere and put it to use if you don't stop."

"It's all devilry," Smee gulped. "Pure and simple."

"Wait!" Hook held up his hand as the TV caught his attention. The sound was turned down, but he grabbed the small black box, called a remote, he had learned, and turned up the sound.

"Police are still investigating the case," a woman's voice reported over the news. "The boy was found over a week ago and is still under severe traumatic stress."

A picture of Peter came on the TV. Hook stared at his pale face, hollow eyes, small frame under a plain gray shirt. He looked like he had died several days ago, like there was nothing left inside.

"The boy answers to the name of Peter," the woman's voice went on, "but no other information is known at present. Those with information, please call the number below."

The picture of Peter disappeared, but Hook kept watching the screen, hoping he would come back.

H&H&H&H&H

"Do you want to draw again?" Ms. Brante asked gently.

Peter shook his head no.

"Why not?" the woman asked. "You drew such pretty pictures of fairies and pirates and –"

"They said they weren't real," Peter whispered.

"They're not," she said. "None of those things are real."

He straightened a little, but he didn't look at her. They kept talking to him, saying the same things over and over, and he was tired. He had never agreed with adults before – such big, stupid things that couldn't fly – but now he decided it was easier to go along with whatever they said.

"Remember what we've talked about the last few days," Ms. Brante kept going. "You've changed your mind a lot in all our stories. You said you fought a man and cut off his hand."

Peter looked at her, waiting.

"But then you said he carried you on his ship and he had both hands. People don't grow back hands after they've been cut off, do they?"

Peter swallowed hard. "_Yes, he did, somehow,_" he wanted to say, but he had argued about this with them before.

"You pretend you're Peter Pan from the fairytale, but you aren't," she kept going, so sweet and soft he wanted to cry. "That's not real. Fairies aren't real."

"Please don't say that," he said hoarsely.

"You're safe here, Peter. That man that hurt you – he can't get you in here. You call him Captain Hook, but he has a real name. He did bad things to you, didn't he?"

"No, yes . . . I don't know."

"Did he hit you?"

"Only a few times," Peter dropped his head.

"Did he do other things? Did he hit you hard enough to make you bruise or bleed? Did he push you to the floor? Did he make you do things that made you uncomfortable?"

Peter nodded. "Yes – he, he –"

"What?" Ms. Brante leaned forward. "What did he do to you?"

"He made me learn to read."

She sat back in her chair, and a small frown of disapproval appeared on her face. "Peter, he didn't teach you to read. He hurt you – he kept you locked away, didn't he? Men like him find small boys and abuse them, sometimes kill them. Help us catch him so he won't kill any other boys."

"The Lost Boys are gone," Peter protested.

She looked sterner still. "We've gone over and over this. You are not Peter Pan. Neverland does not exist. Say it with me. Say the truth. You are not Peter Pan."

He watched her with quiet horror, and then he confessed, "I'm not Peter Pan."

"Neverland doesn't exist."

He swallowed. "Neverland doesn't exist."

"You didn't ever have a fairy named Tinkerbell."

Peter's eyes pricked painfully, but he obediently repeated, "I didn't ever have a fairy named Tinkerbell."

"Captain Hook is not real either," Ms. Brante prompted.

"Captain Hook is not real," Peter's tone was dull, lifeless.

"Now you're going to tell the truth, and tell me who you are. Who are you?"

He opened his mouth, and then he caught sight of papers on the edge of the desk, the same papers everyone brought in whenever they talked with him. The papers were full of scribbles, but Peter recognized some of the shapes.

They were the same ones Hook had made him learn. In the cabin of the ship, with the bunny in the other room – Hook was standing there, still with his hook, not his hand. Hook had been mean then, making him learn those letters. Hook had spanked him – ow, that had hurt. Hook made him sit on hard chairs after he got through spanking, and the lessons went on.

But Hook hadn't been all bad. Hook had helped him feel better when Peter worried about growing up, and Hook had saved him from drowning when the fairy-dust didn't work.

Next to Ms. Brante, the top of the papers had five letters on them: P-E-T-E-R.

Hook had made him learn to spell his name, and Peter had been worried about Tinkerbell and the bunny and getting away, but one thing he knew – Hook would not be ignored. Hook had been unbending then, and when the island started to die, Hook knew what to do.

Hook would find him eventually; Hook had to.

Peter looked at Ms. Brante with defiant eyes.

"I'm Peter Pan! I've always been Peter Pan. And once Hook finds you and sees what you've done, he's going to make you walk the plank!"

Ms. Brante's face fell. She gathered up her papers and got up out of her chair.

"That's right," Peter felt his resolve building. "You go away. You go hide because once I find Hook, we're going to blow this place up. And then we're going to find a ship and fly away from here, back to my island. I'm the king of my island – it's all for me!"

Ms. Brante shut the door, muffling Peter's taunts. "Well, I tried," she told the doctor who was watching through the one-way mirror. "You said he might do better with a woman's touch, but he didn't."

Dr. Mills sighed. "Not good here. No one's come forward to claim the boy."

"I have the forms ready for the institution," Ms. Brante flipped through the pages. "I'll get ready for the transfer tomorrow. Sign here and date."

"Poor kid," Dr. Mills signed the sheet. "Wish we could have helped him."

"Nothing can be done now," Ms. Brante was calm and emotionless. "I'll get a van to drive him up there tomorrow. I'll go along – I have several cases to check up on there."

"Good luck to you," Dr. Mills looked back at the boy who was standing up and furiously beating his arms against the air. "Wish you could fly away from here, Peter. I really do."

H&H&H&H&H

Something moved in Smee's room, and he jerked away with a cry. It was Hook who marched over to the window and flung open the curtains.

"Wake up!" Hook ordered.

Dull dawn light flooded the hotel room.

"Capt'n?" Smee reached for his spectacles.

"Yes – 'Captain'," Hook smirked. "The glorious, industrious, unbeatable Captain Hook. I've figured out where they're holding Peter and how I can get him out. Get up – get dressed. We have a plunder to find and his name is Peter Pan!"


	5. Breaking Through

"It's quite simple," Hook said, rather smugly because he knew Smee would not contradict him. "Some things have changed in this new world, but people haven't. People are still the same. If someone commits a crime, they still get locked up. If someone loves someone else, they get married. Therefore, if someone is acting crazy, as our wretched brat was acting, chances are they lock him up in an asylum. I threatened to lock up that driver whose car I borrowed, and he understood me."

Smee nodded, patiently waiting for the captain to explain what he meant.

"So there are some sorts of asylums here," Hook went on. "Now, back in England, if you had to send a member of your family to an asylum, your family member had to stay there until you went to get them or they died. Peter's alive, but he's being kept in some sort of asylum. I believe they will let me take him out if I show up, pretending to be a family member."

"But you aren't," Smee pointed out.

Hook's eyes narrowed. "I nearly married his mother. That makes me practically a step-father, and I've taken care of him more than anyone else has."

"So you'll claim to be his step-father?"

"No," Hook's face darkened in intense concentration. "They might think his other father would show up, and then we would have to explain. Peter was raving about Neverland which is what made the guards take him in the first place. This world – it doesn't know about the magic. It would think Neverland was a fairytale – a world created by a nursemaid telling bedtime stories. No, no, we'll keep silent on that world. I'll be . . . the boy's uncle."

"Uncle Hook?"

"Uncle James, you idiot. And you – you are my assistant. They don't have servants in this world – they have assistants. Look helpful and organized."

"I-I'm going with you, Captain?" Smee sputtered.

"Yes, we will hire one of the yellow cars, and you will wait in the car while I go inside."

"Go inside where? Where is the boy being held?"

"I couldn't figure that out," Hook admitted. "He must be somewhere in this city, but it's so big and vast. We could search for years and never find him. I could use the telephone to call them and ask where it is, but I'm not really sure how the owners of the asylum would react. What the asylums want, of course, is money. I will have to have a lot of money when I go there, the paper kind that excites everyone I meet. I don't understand it – the plastic cards have as many numbers on it, but everyone prefers the paper."

"Like people in the old world liked chests of gold rather than voucher notes from landowners," Smee suggested.

Hook frowned. That was rather a smart reflection from his otherwise stupid bo'sun, "Maybe. What are you sitting around for? Go to my room and get my suit prepared. The black one with the dark buttons. The white shirt with the starched collar. A blue tie, dark blue. Did you polish my shoes last night?"

"Yes, sir," Smee scrambled out of bed, wearing the clothes he had been in the previous day and headed for the next room.

Hook rolled his eyes. The dumb short man had not learned that people in the new world slept in their underclothes, not their day-clothes. Most men that Hook had seen on the TeeVee woke up in bed with just shorts on. It was scandalous that a gentle lady might be seeing a man almost naked on the TeeVee anytime she turned it on, but Hook decided that it was not his duty to protect the innocence of any woman watching. It would be her duty to protect her modesty by covering her eyes.

But in his endeavor to not be left behind, Hook slept in his shorts, just as all the handsome men on TeeVee did. They seemed to have an endless line of fair damsels to join them in the bed, and as a pirate, Hook approved.

While Smee prepared the morning tea – usually knocking the electrical contraption over at least two times – Hook shaved, got dressed, and checked the mirror to make sure he was at his finest. His sleeves were buttoned, his collar was straight, his shoes shone and reflected the light, and his eyes look a more vibrant light blue against the dark blue of his tie.

"Perfect," Hook smiled.

"Oh, hateful thing," Smee huffed over the hot water that kept spilling over the top. "Where's a kettle and firewood when you want them? Horrid new world and its blasted tea-making . . ."

Hook reached for the leather pouch. It tingled under his hands, the magic throbbing within.

"Where is Peter?" Hook closed his eyes, picturing Alivia's face. The way she looked at him, the way she smiled, the light in her eyes. "Where is he, Alivia? Where's your son?"

He reached into the pouch, and his fingers wrapped around a hard, square object. He pulled it out.

It was slightly bigger than his palm, and the front was lit with bright colors. A red dot was blinking in the middle, and a maze of lines spread out from the dot.

Hook studied it for a few minutes. Then he smiled. "Of course, a map! A map that's alive or electric or whatever they call it here. These lines are streets. They have names, all in little words, but those are streets. This is a map!"

"A map of the new world – impossible to understand," Smee sighed.

"Don't be daft," Hook gave him a withering look. "Despite all I don't know about this new world, I still am a brilliant captain, a ruthless pirate, and a first-class navigator. I can read a map, blind with both hands tied behind my back."

"We're going on a hunt?" Smee looked happy for the first time in days. "Like we used to for treasure?"

"We're going on a hunt," Hook promised. "And we're finding Peter, even if it's the last thing we do."

H& H& H& H& H& H&H

"So, the van will be here in twenty minutes?" Dr. Mills signed the last form and handed it back to Ms. Brante.

"Yes, and he's been very quiet," Ms. Brante looked into the next room where Peter sat at the table, slowly eating the food in front of him. "After he had his medication, I told him I was taking him away from here, to people who would take good care of him, and he seemed to accept that. He dressed himself this morning, and he seems ready to go."

"Good luck to you," the doctor said."I'll see you tomorrow."

Ms. Brante began checking her Blackberry for messages, keeping half an eye on Peter inside the room. The door was open a crack, but he didn't seem to want to make a run for the exit. As he sat eating, Ms. Brante had the impression that he looked older. Not physically, but the look on his face had changed to a calmer, accepting expression.

For a second, she felt sad, almost as if she had witnessed the loss of innocence, the end of childhood, but she concentrated on her messages and let her thumbs fly over the buttons to reply to the messages.

"You won't believe this," Cathy, the department's paralegal and receptionist, hurried up.

"What's wrong?" Ms. Brante looked up from her phone.

"Someone came to claim Peter," Cathy whispered.

Ms. Brante almost dropped the phone. "Who?"

"A man claiming to be his uncle. The name he gave? James Hook."

Ms. Brante lost her composure and raw shock showed on her face. "He came here? Peter's abuser actually came here?"

"He said he's here to take the boy home," Cathy went on. "He expects us to hand Peter over. When I hesitated, he said he was willing to compensate the asylum handsomely, his actual words."

Ms. Brante's eyes darted to Peter and then back to Cathy. "Call the police and the DA. I'm going to get the suspect in one of our interrogation rooms and see if Peter can identify him. If so, our James Hook will be locked up by tonight and pleading guilty to child neglect, abuse, maybe even kidnapping and rape."

"Will do. I'll put him in interview room one," Cathy hurried off.

Schooling her features, Ms. Brante opened the door and gave Peter a polite smile. "Are you finished with breakfast? There's something I'd like you to look at."

Peter ignored her and kept eating.

Ms. Brante put her hands on her hips, her right hand brushing against her security cards that were clipped to her belt.

Peter stood up and followed her. He walked slowly, a lingering effect of the anti-psychotic drugs he was on. As they turned down the hall, Ms. Brante explained,

"Now, he can't see you. He can't hurt you or get to you, but I want you to look in the window and tell me if you recognize anyone in there."

She put her hands on Peter's shoulders and guided him up to the one-way mirror. The man inside surprised her at first – he was dressed in a suit and well-groomed, handsome as sin, and very intelligent looking. Most of the abusers Ms. Brante had seen had been less impressive.

Peter went rigid under her hands. "Hook! That's Hook! He came for me, I knew he would, I knew it the whole time."

Ms. Brante tried to coax him back, but Peter leaned against the glass.

"Hook, it's me. It's Peter. I'm here, I'm here, Hook. They locked me up. Come get me."

"Peter, please," Ms. Brante started, but he shook her off.

"Hook!" Peter slammed both fists on the glass so hard it shook. "Hook!"

Inside, Hook glanced around uneasily. "Peter? Peter, is that you? Where are you?"

"I'm here," Peter hit the glass again. "Why can't he see me? Is this another trick?"

"No, Peter, we have him," Ms. Brante insisted. "He can't hurt you anymore. You're safe now. You never have to see him again."

Peter looked at her fearfully. He looked back at Hook, who stood in the interrogation room, glancing around.

"He's going far, far away," she said, her voice soothing but firm. "You'll never see him again."

Peter turned from her. He felt tears filling his eyes. It was hopeless. All was lost, all was –

Peter grabbed a metal chair by the back and swung it as hard as he could at the glass window. The glass was thick, but the metal legs cracked the glass, sending spider-webs of lines out from the middle.

"Peter!" Ms. Brante reached for him, but he swung the chair again.

One of the metal feet broke through, and Peter shoved against the chair, creating a large hole in the glass.

"Hook!" Peter shouted.

Hook looked at him. "Peter? Is that – the mirror broke and you're on the other side –"

"Emergency!" Ms. Brante screamed. "Call our security officers. Call 911. Get this child molester locked up!"

Several things then happened at once. Hook rushed to the hole in the window and looked through, but it wasn't big enough for him to climb through. But he could see Peter on the other side, fighting against a woman.

Ms. Brante grabbed Peter by the shoulders and dragged him back. The boy fought against her hard, but she was a foot taller than he was, and still slightly drugged, he couldn't get a foothold to fight her off.

Security guards swarmed towards them, five in all, clearly confused but willing to help. Two reached for Peter to help subdue him, but Ms. Brante screamed,

"No, not him. Get the man inside the room. Apprehend him and wait for the police to come arrest him. Get the video of all of this – it's evidence – Peter, stop it!"

"Run, Hook!" Peter yelled. "Run before they get you."

Hook stepped back from the hole in the glass, his blue eyes wide with fear. This was something new, and he stumbled back and ran towards the door he came from. It was locked, but he raised a foot and solidly kicked at the wood. Doors in the new world were thin and fragile, and this one splintered like sticks.

Hook burst through the door only to see three guards running towards him.

"Alivia, Alivia, help me," he whispered.

The guards pulled out their guns and pointed them at Hook as they came closer.

Hook reached into the leather pouch, his hands fumbling for anything that could help as he kept his eyes on the men. His hand closed around the handle of a gun.

He pulled it out and shot up at the ceiling lights.

Sparks and glass flooded the hallway, and the guards ducked out of the way, but Hook charged forward.

He could put on new clothes, he could learn new things – but at the end of the day, he was a pirate. He knew how to fight. He knew how to win.

He knocked the first man out of the way and against the wall. The guard slipped on the glass, and Hook swung the gun at the second guard, slamming the man across the face and hearing his jaw snap shut.

"You stop me," Hook roared at the third guard, "and I'll blow your brains all over this hallway."

The guard stepped cautiously forward, clearly thinking Hook was insane.

Hook punched him in the gut, and when the guard doubled over, Hook shoved him on the other two injured guards.

He ran around the corner to see Peter struggling across the large room with a tall dark-haired woman. Peter was in sight, but there were two more guards and several other people between him and the boy.

"No," Peter shook his head frantically, "no, run, Hook. I'll get out. Just run and I'll find you."

Hook gave him a despairing look before dashing for the door. He had to knock two women and three men out of the way, but he made it out the door. The guards were close behind, but Hook ripped open the taxi door and got in beside Smee.

"Go, go!" he ordered the cab driver. "Get back to the hotel."

The cab driver seeing the gun in Hook's hand stepped on the gas, and the tires squealed as the car pulled away from the curb.

Inside, the atmosphere was agitated as social workers, visitors, and guards tried to figure out what had happened.

"We lost him," a stern-looking guard approached Ms. Brante. "We got the tags from the taxi, we'll inform the police. They'll trail the taxi, and hopefully they'll find the perp by tonight. Are you all right?"

"We're fine," Ms. Brante brushed back loose strands of hair that had fallen in her eyes. "I should have requested backup. I didn't think Peter would react this way. It's my fault – I was so eager to catch that man."

The guard glanced into the room where Peter had broken the glass. He looked back, frowning at the boy. "Are you sure you're all right?"

Peter whimpered slightly, and he turned and wrapped his arms around Ms. Brante.

It was so unexpected that she almost stumbled back. Then she slowly lowered her arms and held the boy close. He was shaking, so upset from what had just happened, and she smoothed his dirty-blond hair with her hand.

"Shh, it's okay. He can't hurt you." She looked up at the guard. "I have him. I'll put him in one of the secure rooms and then talk to the police. I'm supposed to transfer him in an hour, but now everything's a mess. My supervisor's going to take my head off, and someone better call Dr. Mills. This is all such a mess, and it's all my fault."

Outside, sirens were growing louder and louder.

"I'll take him," the guard reached for Peter. "You take care of the police and this situation."

Peter struggled slightly and then he let go of Ms. Brante. Peter refused to look at the guard; he kept his head down and hugged his arms tight over his torso.

Ms. Brante hurried towards the door, her heels clipping against the floor, and the guard guided Peter down the long hallway to the security rooms where he had been held when he first got there.

The guard opened the door, and Peter went inside. Under the guard's cold eyes, Peter sat down on a padded chair and let his head drop in defeat.

The guard nodded, almost smirking, and he slammed the door. He tried the door twice, making sure the security lock held. The guard stomped away, his boots smacking hard on the floor.

Once the noise was gone, Peter lifted up his head. He breathed for a few seconds, trying to quiet the frantic beating of his heart.

Then he loosened his arms from his chest. Tucked between his arms, flat and rectangular with edges that had imprinted on Peter's arms, were Ms. Brante's security cards.

Peter looked at the security box against the closed door where the light blinked red against the slot where Ms. Brante swiped her card to get out.

For the first time in days, Peter smiled.


End file.
